Rated 4 out of
5 by
silverblade from
Good board, documentation could be better, BIOS update for 2011-v4Supermicro boards tend to be pretty good, the previous one I had came with a printed manual and I had no issues with it. Once up and running it works well, the only snag I've hit is that the watchdog timer doesn't seem to respond properly under Linux, though that may be an issue with Linux rather than the board itself.
Though the box contains a quick-reference sheet for the motherboard, there's no printed manual - that's not too much of a problem as it can be downloaded. However both the quick-reference sheet and the printed manual seem inaccurate in places (e.g. jumper settings are the opposite of what's documented, some of the front panel connectors seem to have Vcc/ground reversed - unless the chassis has the cable colours the wrong way around!)
Initially the system wouldn't boot, as it required a BIOS update to support the 2011-v4 CPU I wanted to use. Not being able to boot meant I couldn't update the BIOS, despite there being recovery options on the board itself these rely on a compatible CPU being present in the first place. Scan kindly offered to perform the BIOS update for me, so I'm grateful for that.
Overall it's a good board with lots of expandability.